Friday, July 23, 2010

I've been dreaming about bees.Literally.Since talking about them at the gallery and coming across them in the gardens the other week they've been entering my sleepy adventures.

This native carpenter bee was as big as the end of my thumb and so fuzzy I just wanted to stroke it.

And these little ones...the sugarbag bees....trigona carbonaria....are the ones I want to bring home to live in our garden. I've wanted my own hive of these for the longest time now. But at a few hundred dollars (because the chances and ethics involved in me finding a wild hive are slim) I still can't justify that just yet when there are so many other priorities. But luckily they do visit my garden regularly from somewhere wild in the area, along with their cousins, the blue banded bees who love to work my tomatoes when I have them growing...so I do get to enjoy their sweet little selves often enough. Just not their honey....yet.

And so this morning when I was admiring the beautiful dress my peach tree is embellishing itself with right now I noticed a lone honey bee working the blossoms. I'm not as adoring just more fearful of the honey bee I must admit. My body doesn't like it's venom very much and weeks of major swelling and pain can follow a little sting from these friends...but I felt really wistful watching his lone efforts and I appreciated his work at pollinating my flowers.

We used to have hundreds on the flowers in the front garden years ago. You could here the communal buzz from a distance. But the last few years...none.Have you read about what's happening to the bees?Thinking about this I snapped picture after picture (just click on them for a closer look...I really am a sucker for that fuzz!) of this fellow working almost every flower on that peach tree until he was heavy, and I mean heavy with pollen and off he flew into the blue.It made me realise just how much we need our bees.Thanks to them (I'm guessing/hoping) I do already have one early baby peach from my trees first winter flush of blossoms a month or so ago...and now after today hopefully soon many more.

Lets hope our bees don't just become a thing of our dreams.I do like my peaches...and other fruit...and nuts.... and flowers....and trees...and honey.....

and I'm thinking homegrown peaches are going to be all that much sweeter.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

It's not often that I'm too spontaneous...in the bigger kind of way.I like my plans and I like my rhythm...I like to know what I'm doing before I do it.I don't cope too well with surprise and the unplanned things in life...even the good stuff.

But today...today I said *to heck with it*.I was guilt free today because yesterday I emailed an assignment, I had I admit been procrastinating on, and now excitedly I'm ready to sit the first exam for this part of my course. Yay for me and yay for feeling free to throw caution to the wind and be spontaneous today.

I brushed off the Misters initial request via phone to go for a ride with him to a small job on the coast this morning. The rush of school preparation and trying to get two little ones out of the house fed and packed and dressed, with brushed hair, cleaned teeth and washed faces is not the best time to request anything of this Mama especially something spontaneous. But I quickly reconsidered after listening carefully to that little voice that was indeed whispering *to heck with it*. And luckily so.

While the Mister finished off his small job, the boy and I wandered across the road in search of the sand. We played for an hour or two. Digging, running, befriending the gulls who I know where just hoping for food scraps, and watching the planes fly over from across the Pacific to the airport nearby. I breathed the salty air, sifted sand through my toes and devoured the sounds of the shore before meeting up with Kyle for a lunch date with our boy. A lemonade treat by the sea for him and something hearty and bubbly for us.

I think I still like my rhythm as much as appreciating the expected...I don't think that will change in a hurry but I sure do know that the *to heck with it* days can be pretty blissful especially when they turn out to be this kind of spontaneous Tuesday. And not an ounce of guilt in sight...well maybe only because our sweet girl wasn't there.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Yesterday saw my boy and I stealing my lovely sister from her office and tripping off to our Mt Coot-tha Botanical Gardens.I had in hand, ready to deliver personally, two postcards I had put together for Sophie Munns' open studio week in *Homage to the Seed" and in celebration of the UN International Year of Biodiversity. I wrote about Sophie's call for Seedy Postcards from the blogosphere here.

It was such a treat to meet Sophie and surround myself in her work in person. The beauty of her art and her passion for *spreading the message* together with the abundance of work was breathtaking to me...truly inspiring.As was the web and feeling of community, the branching and connection of people through both the open studio and Sophie's clever idea for the mail art show. The postcards were so diverse in their origins and creativity and thought. Beautiful. You really must visit Sophie's blog to have a look at them all and to see other happenings of the week there.

So after the warmest chat with Sophie (what an astute and gracious lady), poring over Sophie's wonderful journals, admiring the beauty of her art on the walls, touching and holding the most amazing array of seeds and pods and capsules, learning about soap nuts and tasting delicious fresh lemon myrtle tea I left for home. But not empty handed or hearted...I left with my own twig of lemon myrtle leaves, the plan to start washing with soap nuts (oh yes...how amazing!), the desire to pick up my own paintbrush and oil paints again very soon but most touchingly a feeling of connection to something budding, authentic and joyful. Indeed Sophie is planting the seed.

And on this slightly blustery afternoon here I have stolen a quiet moment to sip my own freshly made lemon myrtle tea and think about the significance of these ideas and Sophie's work in *Homage to the Seed*.

Thank you Sophie for the time you spent with us yesterday...I could have stayed in that glorious space all day.

Friday, July 9, 2010

There is sea air to breathe, there are hills to whizz down in wooden rope driven go karts, there is walking to be done, waves to watch roll in, sandcastles to build, mangroves to explore and crabs and yabbies to try and catch.There are dusky hours to steal away with Grandad fishing by the creek listening to a lone whip bird and watching the tide slowly flow in and then turn.There are banksia trees to tangle your tackle in first cast and there are fish to be caught....and released back to their salty homes being not quite big enough for our dinner this time.

The sun we were following really only joined us in it's full glory for maybe one day....but it did not matter in the least.We had sunny homemade lemonade to drink... juiced straight from the treesand warm beds inside a beautifully crafted owner built country home...filled with new and old... family treasures passed down through time and all still holding their little pieces of their keepers. I really must get to photographing it all.But best of all we had Grandad and Grandma and now the desire to escape back down there with them again soon.But we are home now and in wind down mode for back to school next week.I'm thinking the little man is going to be lost without his big sister for a while. They are a pretty inseparable pair which is warming to a Mama's heart.So we are enjoying our last few full days together.We all have a spring in our step here...because life this last week was indeed very very good!

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more.... Lord Byron